Games where the Atari ST version was.....

[Havie]

Originally Posted by mcgeezer

Most people in the late 80's and early 90's who were gamers didn't have a monitor, they'd use the built in tv modulator (on the ST) or the add-on for the Amiga to connect it to a CRT. One of the ways you could get an ST to have a larger screen was to pop the machine into 60Hz(NTSC) mode, pretty much all menu disks offered this options.

I remember seeing an early game on the Amiga at the computer club I used to visit (might have been Clown O Mania), the game had full over scan and music that beat any Atari ST to death at the time. As an ST owner seeing the over scan on a CRT from an Amiga game was pretty awesome, especially when all the technical demos of the Atari ST were all striving for full over-scan... they could do it, but not in a game.

No Atari ST owner seen the 320x200 limitation with a massive border as a plus over the Amiga, anyone who says otherwise is either die hard ST or delluded.

I shared an ST with my flat mate at the time (and I loved it and the games which were a huge step up from my Speccy) and the border wasn't an issue but it was really impressive when software used the border such as Neo Paint (I think) but when I got my Amiga - workbench and games could have no borders because of the hardware which was infinitely more impressive to me!

And as for the sound - I remember making a tape of Amiga games tunes to give my ST owning (no ex) flat mate. He was suitably impressed.

[roondar]

I was never really all that bothered by the borders around games to be fair. It happened on pretty much all systems (I used a TV back in the day so I couldn't resize the image anyway) and I was still used to it from my C64 days.

As I recall it, there wasn't much discussion about borders/screensizes anyway. Games/demos that used a bigger screen were impressive but rare. In fact, it was only on the Amiga that I saw overscan semi-regularly (much more often than on the C64 anyway). Here in Europe the consoles always had borders so they didn't have full screens either. I suppose it's a different story in NTSC areas where they did have full screen console gaming.

Anyway, the ST was a nice system. My dad had one, as did a friend. I liked my Amiga more, but that's how it goes with something you own yourself

[Gilbert]

Originally Posted by lilalurl

1 second is what it would take a moderator to lock the thread...

Seriously, can't you guys take a bit easier? You can both have interesting points to put forward. No need to get this aggressive.

Fair enough I will stay away. But I have never actually been aggressive towards him. Have never called him anything despite what he has said about me and I actually wrote him a reasonable message considering...

Originally Posted by Konrad

Gilbert, he didn't really agree. he wrote "It’s true though, at least from a practical standpoint if you have an adjustable screen".
Practical because you have an adjustable screen you can stretch the picture to be full screen. You can do the same with the Amiga.
Atari games mostly run with 320x200, so normally you just have to adjust once.
Amiga games switch resolution more often. Would be annoying to adjust frequently. So you leave it like it is, showing some games in fullscreen, some with border on the bottom.

So technical the Amiga is much better here and offers more.
You just get mislead because of the above described visual aspect.
You can of course adjust the screen for Amiga games same way as for Atari, if that suits your liking.

I see what you are saying but that does actually mean that Atari ST owners do experience (even if not technically true) more full-screen games than Amiga owners. So maybe from their point of view it would seem like their games fill the screen more. I'll let you know if I ever remember what games that podcast guy was talking about.

BTW why does CD32 still have so many 320 x 200 games. Because that is AGA - can't be to do with Atari ST ports and surely CD32 was only in PAL territories at the time? You'd think it would be quite easy to check region and at least centre the screen for us in PAL regions

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by Gilbert

BTW why does CD32 still have so many 320 x 200 games. Because that is AGA - can't be to do with Atari ST ports and surely CD32 was only in PAL territories at the time? You'd think it would be quite easy to check region and at least centre the screen for us in PAL regions

I am not really interested in Amiga games, but the Demoscene is my personal obsession, and almost NO Amiga demos are 320x200, not the ones I've seen, anyway, they're usually 320x256, 640x512, or beyond with overscan of varying degrees.

I think most software houses were still kowtowing to the NTSC market (what little of it there was left), so they used 320x200 for the games, and from what I've heard, unless you have European hardware in the States together with a whole host of converters and adapters, you are NEVER going to get a native NTSC display to be able to show a whole 320x256 screen on Amiga, unless they released hardware that deals in both, like I've had PAL CRTs that also used NTSC (complete with tint controls).

[britelite]

Originally Posted by Foebane

and almost NO Amiga demos are 320x200

You haven't really watched a lot of demos from the past 20 years? Considering the majority of all AGA-demos are 320x200 (or less).

[Konrad]

There is no lesser resolution than 320x200.
There may be effects, especially 3d rotating effects or such, which are calculated at lower resolution in some demos. Those are then upscaled/stretched to f.ex. 320x200. Still, the factual screen resoution of the screen itself is at least 320x200.

[britelite]

Originally Posted by Konrad

There is no lesser resolution than 320x200.

Sure there is, you can pretty much define any vertical resolution for the screen. The timings will of course still be PAL (on a PAL machine), but the visible screen will be whatever you define it to be.

[Konrad]

Proof please for demos opening a screen with lower resolution than 320x200?

[britelite]

Originally Posted by Konrad

Proof please for demos opening a screen with lower resolution than 320x200?

For example this one uses a screen of 320x180.

EDIT: correct link

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Konrad

Proof please for demos opening a screen with lower resolution than 320x200?

My last intro Colombia, 320x180

https://www.pouet.net/prod.php?which=85242

I thank you

[DanScott]

The reason for this resolution is quite simple.. it's 16:9, and can fill the whole of the competition screen during the live demo competitions (rather than being letterboxed)

Eon by The Black Lotus is another one at 320x180

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by britelite

You haven't really watched a lot of demos from the past 20 years? Considering the majority of all AGA-demos are 320x200 (or less).

What I mean is, demos that use just the top 4/5ths of the screen, just like the games do, leaving the bottom blank. There are a few that do just that, but yes, Britelite, most high-end AGA demos will have a smaller window, but in the centre of the screen, so it feels like a widescreen movie, and it was this second type of 320x200 (or less) that I didn't mention.

[britelite]

Originally Posted by Foebane

and it was this second type of 320x200 (or less) that I didn't mention.

Sure, sure...

EDIT: and that's why you said:

they're usually 320x256, 640x512, or beyond with overscan of varying degrees.

right?

[kremiso]

prolly a bit off topic, but do you know what resolution Wings of Death 2 (Lethal Xcess) use on Atari ST?
i'm playing it via Steem, and at game start seems using an higher (medium?) one...

wondering if better than the Amiga counterpart, if so should fit in this thread

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by britelite

Sure, sure...

EDIT: and that's why you said:



right?

Sorry, I was thinking of stock A500/A600/A1200 demos from the early 90s when I said that, they tended to be fullscreen on PAL.

[roondar]

Originally Posted by kremiso

prolly a bit off topic, but do you know what resolution Wings of Death 2 (Lethal Xcess) use on Atari ST?
i'm playing it via Steem, and at game start seems using an higher (medium?) one...

wondering if better than the Amiga counterpart, if so should fit in this thread

According to the "official Lethal Xcess page", the game has the same resolution on both systems (320x256).

Read more here (also interesting info on Wings of Death): http://www.edv-rudolf.de/lethal-xcess/tech.htm

[kremiso]

Originally Posted by roondar

According to the "official Lethal Xcess page", the game has the same resolution on both systems (320x256).

Read more here (also interesting info on Wings of Death): http://www.edv-rudolf.de/lethal-xcess/tech.htm

thank you
i can't explain better, i don't know if it is something related to ST-E enhancement or just the emulator display output, but i am testing various ST games atm, and until now happened just with this one (apart some crack intros)

for certainly, i can say also that ok the audio is worse, but the game runs little better than Amiga, smoother (Steem vs WinUAE)

[roondar]

Interesting.. As I understand it the games should be identical, but I've never tested them side by side

[dreadnought]

Have just read that DotC was better on ST in regard to gameplay. It's possible, as the Amiga version was rushed and the subsequent ones were more complete and expanded.

Also heard that Captain Blood was better on ST (more features, better speech, faster). Wonder if that's true. These two are some of my favourite games so might compare it later myself.

Another opinion is that ST was faster in 3D games. True/false?

[roondar]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Another opinion is that ST was faster in 3D games. True/false?

This isn't really an opinion, it's more of a fact
The ST has a slightly faster processor/bus (by around 12%), which were the limiting factor of 3D games on both systems. Ergo, the ST will do 3D games better.

At the same time, the weird way that display memory is organized on the ST also gives it an advantage for raycasting. Apparently, you can use a specific instruction on the ST to allow it do CPU drawing much faster than on the Amiga (move.p). Maybe the new findings by KK/Altair show that this advantage is less pronounced than it used to be, but IIRC there's a wolvenstein like game for the Atari ST that actually runs quite decently.